What's going there? Father of NBA stars Chris and J.R. Smith to open sneaker store in Millstone

Mar. 13, 2014

The New York Knicks' J.R. Smith drives to the basket during a 2013 NBA basketball game against the Indiana Pacers in New York. Smith's father, Earl Smith, will build a new strip mall in Millstone Township. / ASSOCIATED PRESS

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Earl Smith -- the father of J.R. Smith, who plays professional basketball for the New York Knicks -- will open a high-end sneaker shop and lease two office spaces on this construction site in Millstone. / ANTHONY PANISSIDI/STAFF PHOTO

MILLSTONE TOWNSHIP — When you see more cats, deer, dogs, horses and sheep than people, you know you’ve entered Millstone Township.

With a quiet and rural landscape like that one, you must find it hard to imagine what the township could possibly share in common with the New York Knicks, who routinely play professional basketball before thousands of screaming fans inside Madison Square Garden in the heart of the city that never sleeps.

However, Earl Smith – the father of both Chris Smith, who previously played for the Knicks, and more notably J.R. Smith, who still plays for the Knicks – wants to make some noise in the quiet township. He will build a 2,700-square-foot single-story mini strip mall with room for three tenants and 21 parking spots on a construction site that borders Perrineville Road near Millstone Road.

In the middle store, Smith and his four children – Stephanie, 31, J.R., 28, Chris, 26, and Dimitrius, 21 – will open “Team Swish,” a high-end sneaker shop that will sell the brand name footwear of star athletes, such as Michael Jordan. Meanwhile, the other two spaces that will flank Smith’s store will function as offices, but the search for tenants continues, even though construction will begin in two weeks and finish in June.

For Smith, the development of the site means more than just a business venture. The vacant land once held the home where his parents raised their five boys – including Smith, who began living in the home at the age of 4 – and four girls. Then, a fire during the early 1990s left their home uninhabitable. Afterward, Smith’s family moved to Lakewood, but he later returned to demolish the remnants of his childhood. In 1998, he submitted plans to the township to reinvent the land.

“(My family’s) had that spot for 52 years,” said Smith, who declined to reveal the cost of the project. “It was my dad’s spot; he gave it to me and I’m doing something with it.”

Smith already owns Big Earl’s Masonry LLC, a company based in the township that specializes in construction. Still though, you may wonder why he would choose to open another business in such a lightly traveled area. And you may further wonder why he would open, of all things, a high-end sneaker shop in the middle of a town filled with farms where it’s more fitting to wear a pair of old boots, especially when it rains.

Granted, Smith’s new strip mall will sit in the downtown section of the township, but if you’ve driven through this area before, then you know it’s generous to describe it as “downtown.” After all, the commercial sector of the otherwise completely residential township includes a pizzeria and pharmacy among a handful of family-owned businesses in a single strip mall, which sits across the street from a couple more freestanding businesses, including a real estate office.

But Smith already considered the scarcity of traffic in the township. While his store will function as a retailer that caters to walk-in customers, he mostly anticipates Internet sales.

“I got it in with a lot of NBA players, so a lot of the guys are supporting the store,” said Smith, whose sons Chris and J.R. previously played basketball for Lakewood High School before they transferred to St. Benedict’s Preparatory School in Newark. “It’s going to be worldwide. Everything’s going to be shipped in and shipped out.”

Have you seen a construction project in Monmouth or Ocean counties and wanted to know what was being built there? Contact staff writer Anthony Panissidi at 732-643-4284 or apanissidi@gannett.com, and he will look into it for a future column. Visit www.app.com/whatsthere for previous stories.